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Lawbreakers dev: PC/console cross-platform play is “dumb”

Given that the majority of my friends game on console, there are a lot of a games I don't buy because there's no point in playing them alone. If they had cross-play with PC I'd buy them day 1.

So what more "dumb", not being able to figure out a solution to the different control schemes, or losing sales.

Also, a lot of games and game modes wouldn't require controller scheme parity. Sports games and co-op games in general should have pc-console cross play.
 
Cross play is best thing since bread for multiplayer honestly, I can play any mode of rocket league even when it says only 500 are playing that mode.
COD and other games have totally dead modes on PC after release week
 
hasn't this worked out fine for gears 4, oddly enough? Last I checked, they found no huge discrepancy in winrate with pc vs console so they just rolled pc into the normal matchmaking.

I only play Horde, but I played all weekend and 99% of players were xbox one. If not for crossplay I doubt I'd have found any matches. I'm sure they appreciated my sniping but yeah that's a co-op mode.
 
I do think in a perfect world a PC player should be able to swap to controller and go cross-play, GoW4 could have done with that at launch. Or vice versa with M+K on a console. I imagine the amount of people who'd use it would be minimal though so perhaps it's simply not worth the work.
 
Cliff is right about this but he is also a total buffoon for putting it like he did. Even if your'e right sometimes its the way you say something that matters and he did a real poor job right there.
 
Mupod said:
hasn't this worked out fine for gears 4, oddly enough? Last I checked, they found no huge discrepancy in winrate with pc vs console so they just rolled pc into the normal matchmaking.

I only play Horde, but I played all weekend and 99% of players were xbox one. If not for crossplay I doubt I'd have found any matches. I'm sure they appreciated my sniping but yeah that's a co-op mode.
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Gears and Lawbreakers play completely different. So to expect the same results would be a bit silly.
 
I remember when Portal 2 came out and I did something with my PS3 where I connected the two. Whatever happened after that? It sits in limbo and no one really cares about the feature.

I don't think it's dumb. I just think there's no need for it. There's not a lot of people who really care. Outside of competitive gaming the idea is probably much more appreciative.

Edit: except getting more people to play together. That thought just crossed my mind.

Large console base means you don't have to worry about it
 
cross play is hard to equalize for fairness, to many variables with PC setups. also cheating would be hard to control

cross save I hope will happen. just bring over my characters and stuff so I don't have to level again. not so much for this game but for destiny 2.
 
He's right when it comes to any game you aim in.

And stop saying "just ad m&k support to the console version." The majority of console gamers are going to be sprawled on a couch with a controller regardless of good the m&k support is. If they were fans of m&k they'd be buying the PC version anyhow.
 
Quasar said:
Then Cliffs argument makes even less sense.
Click to expand...
In what way? It's an option as long as K&M is the primary input option then it's not much of a problem if someone chooses not to use it. That's their choice to "disadvantage" themselves.
gypsygib said:
Given that the majority of my friends game on console, there are a lot of a games I don't buy because there's no point in playing them alone. If they had cross-play with PC I'd buy them day 1.

So what more "dumb", not being able to figure out a solution to the different control schemes, or losing sales.

Also, a lot of games and game modes wouldn't require controller scheme parity. Sports games and co-op games in general should have pc-console cross play.
Click to expand...
Well it's a balancing act. If there had input option filters for example in their playlist that means more segmentation across playlist that would likely already be segmented come release by game modes.
Skronk said:
Couldn't they filter matchmaking by controller type? That way friends who play on different systems could still play together.
Click to expand...
That friends part requires additional work/cost outside of just doing crossplay see Rocket League so that even more unlikely.
 
I agree with cliff, segmenting your community like that automatically makes the online competive environment less appealing.
 
Quasar said:
Then Cliffs argument makes even less sense.
Click to expand...

Not really. Not supporting controller on PC could be the difference of someone not physically being able to play your game at all and them being able to accommodate themselves at their own risk.

As someone who played the beta on PC with a mouse and keyboard, I'll say one more time, trust me, you don't want cross-play; more than any other game I've ever seen on PC, this game is fucking brutally fast.

Quake Champions felt relaxed in comparison.
 
Xer0 said:
Could be referencing M+KB vs controller, in which case...I mean, yeah.
Click to expand...

So let console owners plug in a keyboard and mouse like he did through Epic for Unreal Tournament 3?

Let both sides turn on/off as they see fit like most other cross-play titles?
 
Skyzard said:
I wonder how popular those devices to let you hook up a mouse and keyboard to your PS4 are these days in competitive MP games.

And how many people use pads on MP pc games...

Such an annoying issue, wish there was a better way and one that allowed cross-play but sorted you into which control method you want to play with.
Click to expand...

Overwatch is lousy with KBM.

I like your solution, but since the popular KBM solutions like XiM read as a Dualshock 4, it still wouldn't work.
 
It definitely depends on the genre. In Rocket League, I'm glad for cross platform play. It makes sense there. But I have no issue with keeping things separate in an FPS.
 
gypsygib said:
Given that the majority of my friends game on console, there are a lot of a games I don't buy because there's no point in playing them alone. If they had cross-play with PC I'd buy them day 1.

So what more "dumb", not being able to figure out a solution to the different control schemes, or losing sales.

Also, a lot of games and game modes wouldn't require controller scheme parity. Sports games and co-op games in general should have pc-console cross play.
Click to expand...
Destroing PC version's quality just to chase after some niche group that doesn't accept anything but crossplay would be the dumb choice.

And he's clearly saying that solely about his own game, instead of crossplay in general. Nobody complains about crossplay in Rocket League.
 
Gears of war not giving an advantage to KB/M sounds anecdotal. Does that game not have headshots or something? Is it just a huge random cone of fire where you aim?
 
I agree with him. Some people in the Scorpio thread argued 30fps vs 60fps would be an issue, k & m vs controller is 999999 times worse than that. Especially in an arena shooter.

We haven't had a cliffy b tweet thread in a while. Those used to be closed pretty quickly if memory serves.
 
Onlinehero said:
Gears of war not giving an advantage to KB/M sounds anecdotal. Does that game not have headshots or something? Is it just a huge random cone of fire where you aim?
Click to expand...

You have to be spot on for headshots.

Gears of War 4 just simply shouldn't be in this conversation; the gameplay is nothing like most shooters; it does it's own thing (cover/ground movement is huge) and it having absolutely zero verticality (jumping/dbl jump/walljump/shieldjump/rocketjump/flying/rocket boosting etc etc) certainly factors into this conversation to some degree.
 
Didn't Shadowrun on Xbox 360 do this successfully? IIRC, they got the aim assist on console to balance out the accuracy of m&k.

I could be remembering wrong but I could have swore that was a big win for that game.
 
meh, it's really not an issue with how much auto-aim algorithms have progressed... is it? [kb/m vs. gamepad]

there used to be a few gamepad users in the Titanfall PC community who were 100% competitive with us kb/m players.
 
How esports a game are we talking about here? Asking because that adds the appropriate context to the kb/m to gamepad disparity argument.

If it's just for funsies then at excuse is just bullshit.
 
Here's an older answer by CliffyB to porting and cross-platform for this game.


“People are like ‘You’re never coming to console,’ and I’m like ‘I never said that’,” he said. “Boss Key is 40 people. Even if we wanted to do a console version, we couldn’t right now.”

“We wouldn’t be able to do the port ourselves. We’d need a really great partner that could knock it out of the park, keep it 60Hz, nail the controls, and make it fantastic.”

“Some of the Epic engineers came over and we had a conversation where I was like ‘Good luck porting this to consoles.’ One of them looked at me and said ‘Titanfall’s crazy wall-jumping, wall-running, and verticality, and that works on PC and console.’ With the right amount of aim-assist and the right amount of little tricks, I could see it working. I wouldn’t want to do the cross-platform play, though. I don’t think the effort’s worth the outcome there.”

“The bigger a company gets, the more accountability happens, the more things get overthought. When that happens, creativity suffers. I’m not saying great things can’t come out of big companies, but I’m saying that it’s harder than in small companies.”
Click to expand...
 
curiouscharles said:
meh, it's really not an issue with how much auto-aim algorithms have progressed... is it? [kb/m vs. gamepad]

there used to be a few gamepad users in the Titanfall PC community who were 100% competitive with us kb/m players.
Click to expand...

One of the world's greatest console Titanfall teams (if not the greatest) and winners of dozens of tournaments, Exertus Zen, entered a PC tournament using gamepads and lost 2-0 (they forfeit before they could properly finish the match) against a team of Team Fortress 2 players that had been thrown together right before the tournament started. Even with auto aim aim assist.

If gamepad users were competitive against you, then frankly you weren't very good.
 
yanipheonu said:
xZLWvnYwxkpNEt8JByAEkVJ7rsA=.gif
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And people complain when game devs be PC ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ the reality is some can't handle the truth.
 
I disagree that cross-play in general is "dumb".

It depends on the genre.

Of course, for COMPETITIVE shooters and RTS, it doesn't work well.

But it works great for coop, and for other genres (like racing, platforming, RPGs, etc).

But, well.. It's Cliffy B we're talking about. Lack of tact and knee jerk reactions is expected.
 
Shao Kahn Brewing a Stew said:
Here's an older answer by CliffyB to porting and cross-platform for this game.

“People are like ‘You’re never coming to console,’ and I’m like ‘I never said that’,” he said. “Boss Key is 40 people. Even if we wanted to do a console version, we couldn’t right now.”

“We wouldn’t be able to do the port ourselves. We’d need a really great partner that could knock it out of the park, keep it 60Hz, nail the controls, and make it fantastic.”

“Some of the Epic engineers came over and we had a conversation where I was like ‘Good luck porting this to consoles.’ One of them looked at me and said ‘Titanfall’s crazy wall-jumping, wall-running, and verticality, and that works on PC and console.’ With the right amount of aim-assist and the right amount of little tricks, I could see it working. I wouldn’t want to do the cross-platform play, though. I don’t think the effort’s worth the outcome there.”

“The bigger a company gets, the more accountability happens, the more things get overthought. When that happens, creativity suffers. I’m not saying great things can’t come out of big companies, but I’m saying that it’s harder than in small companies.”
Click to expand...


The above makes a lot more sense.

As far as a general idea-

Tons of negativity in the thread. Never did like that about this hobby. I will say this- there are a ton of controller users in FPS's these days on PC. That's fine- not my choice, but if someone wants to go that route, cool.

I will say that having a bigger player base is never never a bad thing. Some good MP games have died entirely too early over the years. At the bare minimum have an option "opt in to play with PC users?" or "mixed equipmant quickplay". A game like Lawbreakers seems like it's a good fit for PC sure- but if the day ever comes that it can hit consoles as well, I'm sure both sets of people wouldn't mind the option.

Here's food for thought- what is the percentage of those that use PCs are of the enthusiast- must run at 60+ fps with dialed in network settings, configured multi tier mouse sensitivity? I'd wager that there are tons of people in older hardware running stuff maxed at 20 fps in the player pools for some FPS games these days. I'd say I'd rather take a controller and a fixed 30 on a console if I had to choose which one could be more competitive given the same skill sets but different controllers.

All of that to say: more options in our hobby is never a bad thing.
 
Prototype Viktor said:
Good thing the PS4 doesn't support keyboard and mou...oh wait
Then require kb/m on crossplay
Click to expand...

How many people would use it? Niche of a niche. And you would need to maintain separate version of PS4 Lawbreakers with different balancing solely for this petite group of players.
And of course, since console patching process is slow the PC version would have to wait for every single petite fix for console version of the patch to be certified.


So yeah, it could be done, just like you can eat a steak with just a spoon, but it realistically makes no sense to try.
 
OdysseusVA said:
just add native m&kb support on the ps4, buddy :)
Click to expand...

No thanks.

People don't play on PS4 to feel as though they're disadvantaged by using the default controller.

I'll never support competitive console game that supports KBM. Echoing Cliffs comments, it's dumb. Either way you spin it, it creates a huge barrier to the competitive experience for the console players.
 
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